The weight of smoke
The world goes quiet for five seconds before he walks in,that's how it happened the first time,that's how I know something is coming,not him,not Yemi,something worse.I don't think, hold Yemi's hand and speak the oldest words.
''Iba wa o,iba ota,iba awon alaye''.
The knife should have found my throat,instead,we twist in unison,his wounded side against my shoulder,his blood warm between us.
The blade glances off air,the leader recovers fast,too fast. His eyes are wrong,bright like kerosene catching flame.Behind him,the other two rise. The one I set on fire is still smoldering.Shit.
Yemi moves,even wounded,even bleeding out minutes ago,he's fluid,dangerous.He kicks the second man's knee sideways,something cracks,he snatches the fallen blade mid-air. He doesn't stab,he stands between me and them,knife low.
''Don't'',he mutters,a catch in his voice.
The leader laughs,wet,like water through clogged pipes.
''The ogbanje protects his witch,how tender''. He tilts his head. ''But who protects her from you?''
Yemi doesn't answer,but his hand in mine loosens,just slightly,just enough for me to feel doubt.
I should let go, but every time I try something in my chest clenches.You touched me and the world answered.
The leader raises his blade,and Egbere's mat weeps.The cold drops over the room like a shroud,not temperature,absence,from the mat rises a shape,not solid,but something,with too many joints and mouth that opens sideways.
Yemi's shadow tears free from his body,I feel it happen,his hand in mine goes cold,his knee buckles.
''No''.His voice is shredded.''Onome''.
I drag his hand to my chest,press his palm flat against my breast,over my hammering heart,the chant rises from my throat like it's always lived there.
''Ma je ki o lo.
Ma je ki o ya.
Pada si ara re''.
Do not let him go,e time never reach,do not let him tear,return to your body.
His shadow stops mid stretch.
The creature keens,the leader snarls.I poured everything I have into those words,into the place where his palm meets my heartbeat and I pull.His shadow snaps back.
Yemi gasps like he is a broken surface,his eyes find mine,wide terrified in a way they weren't when men were kicking down my door.
''What''
''Don't ask''.My voice isn't steady.
''Just fight''.
The creature is reforming,the leader is circling,my ward is dead,my shop shattered,but I'm still standing. So is he.We move together.
I don't remember the rest.Fire mine,not theirs. The creature unraveling,the leader's face contorting from triumph to fear.Then silence.
His men,down,breathing,the creature,ash,the leader,gone.I stand in what used to be my sanctuary, Yemi is on his knees,I didn't notice him fall,he's braced on my floor,head bowed,shoulders shaking,his wounds still pulsing silver.But his shadow stays where it belongs. I should check on him,instead,I watch my shop bleed.
The front door hangs from one hinge,lanterns dead,shelves toppled,tinctures broken,herbs I spent months harvesting crushed underfoot. The ewe asunwon i was weighing when he walked in,scattered,mixed with glass and blood.My blood?His?Both.
The photo of me and grandma is crooked on the wall,her face looking back at me,nine years old,chin lifted like I wasn't afraid.I was afraid,I've always been afraid.
''Onome'', his voice,quiet,just my name,held out like an offering,I don't turn, ''The ward is broken,it took three years to build it,my grandmother taught me,she said a good ward is like a good boundary,firm but flexible.Knows what to let in and what to keep out.
Silence, then,'' I'm sorry''.
''I let you in'' I turn.''I don't know why''.
''You should have let me die''.
Flat,not accusing,just fact.
He's still on his knees,his shirt is ruined,dark with blood,his face is pale,but his eyes,steady.Watching me.
''I came to your door because I had nowhere else to go'' he says. ''I knew it was you,I knew what you were,what I was to you but I came anyway, this is not your fault,it's mine''.
I don't know what to do with that,I don't know what to do with him,this man who bleeds on my floor and apologizes for existing,whose shadow tried to leave his body and whose hand is still warm from where I pressed it to my heart..
''They will come back'' he says. He is standing now,one hand pressed to his side, ''not tonight,not tomorrow,but they know where we are and they know what you are to me''.
''I flinch'', ''I'm not anything to you''.
Something flickers across his face,pain,curiosity,recognition.
''You touched me and the world answered ''.I have no reply.
From outside,Madam Grace.''Onome? Is everything ok? I heard breaking''.
I move to the door,block her view,smile like a mask.
''Dropped a shelf, i will sort it in the morning''.
She peers at me,her eyes flick to my hands,still smeared with his blood,I tuck them behind my back.
''You sure,my dear?''
''Fine,just tired''.
A pause,she retreats. ''You rest,ehn,you work too hard''.
''Yes ma''.
I close what's left of the door,Yemi is watching me. ''You lied for me''.
''I lied for myself''.But we both know that's not the whole truth.
I can't stay here.The words feel like swallowing glass,like abandoning the only place i've ever belonged,but i know,with the same certainty that made me grab his hand, that staying means dying. Not today,not tomorrow but soon and not just me.
They know where I am now,they won't stop coming.
I move through the shop on autopilot,my grandmother's books into a bag,her mortar and pestle,bottled tinctures wrapped in my spare lappa.The photo from the wall,pressed between the pages of her oldest book.
I pause at the aale symbol on the floor,cracked,broken.The lines i drew with such care now severed. I could redraw it,I could stay.
NO.
I reach for my keys.
''I need to get some things'',Yemi says.
''Five minutes,then we leave''.
The alley smells like diesel and yesterday's rain,Yemi waits by the corner,still pale,still bleeding but still standing.
I lock the back door.
''I never asked,where are we going?''
A pause,''i have a place,outside the city''.
''Hmmm a safe house?''
His mouth twitches,almost a smile.
''Something like that''.
We walk.
Lagos is awake,danfo horns,akara sellers,children in pressed uniforms,no one sees the blood on his shirt,the shattered look in my eyes,just two more strangers.
Yemi flags a taxi,we move,weaving through traffic,leaving my street behind.
I watch my shop shrink in the rearview mirror,it was mine,now it's gone.
''Onome''.
His voice is low,the driver's radio plays fuji music.
I don't turn ''What''.
''The men who came last night work for someone,someone who has been hunting me for years,someone who knows what i am and wants to use it''.
''And what are you?''
Silence,then soft ''I don't know anymore. I thought I did,then you touched me and now I don't know anything at all''.
I turn.
He looks exhausted,human,not a monster,just someone who has been alone for a long time,
''I should have let them take me,I should never have come to you''.
''But you did''.
''Yes''.
''Why?''
His eyes hold mine,the taxi rattles over a pothole.
''For twenty four years,I have dreamt of a woman with herbs in her hand,fire in her blood,i wake up reaching for her,I searched every city,every market and I finally found you in ikeja''.
My heart stops.
''That's not possible''.
''I know your grandmother taught you to stand in the gap,i know you sleep with the light on,I know you talk to her when you are lonely even though she never answers''.His voice drops to a whisper. ''I know because I have been dreaming about you my whole life and tonight I finally understood why''.
The taxi slows,a gate,high and wrought iron,trees,a house hidden behind them.He leans closer,his breath warm,his voice is the quietest thing in the world.
''The man hunting me isn't after wealth,he is trying to prevent a prophecy. One that says the ogbanje and a witch will unite and their child will be strong enough to unmake the world''.
I can't breath.
''There is no child,there is no us,we are strangers''.
He looks at me,his hand finds mine on the seat between us,not desperate,just there,warm.
''Not anymore'',he says.
The gate opens.The world does not go quiet,it listens,I feel it,the shift. Not silence but attention,like the veil between worlds has turned its gaze towards us,like every spirit,every ancestor,every waiting thing is holding its breath.
His grip tightens.
''Onome,whatever happens next''...
''Don't''. I cut him off. ''Don't say goodbye,don't apologize,don't tell me you should have let them take you'',I met his eyes. ''You came to my door,you bled on my floor,you made me touch you and now my magic knows yours and I just abandoned my grandmother's shop for a man I met six hours ago''.
I pause.
''So whatever you are about to say, save it because we are not done yet''.
Something shifts in his face,beneath the grief,the guilt,something that looks like hope.
''No'',he says quietly. ''I suppose we are not''.
The taxi pulls forward,the trees swallow the morning light,behind us,the gate closes with a sound like a lock turning and somewhere,in the thin place between worlds,something has been waiting for us since before we were born finally opens it's eyes.